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BELPRE - Knox Energy recently notified 43 of its customers that their natural gas service would be disconnected Oct. 29, stating the local supply gathering system will be unable to provide reliable service.
Vanessa Hamilton, chief business development officer for Canton-based Knox Energy, said the area affected is solely supplied by local production. Several weeks ago, Knox Energy operations staff met with Bob Wilson, president of Wilson Energy, and were told the well conditions had worsened and couldn't continue to meet the demand of all customers.
Hamilton said that last year Wilson met with Knox Energy and said the wells were depleting and customers could experience outages during extreme temperatures. In a letter dated Sept. 30, 2025, customers were notified of this potential change and urged to look for alternate heating solutions.
Now, 43 of the approximately 160 Knox Energy customers whose service is supplied by Wilson Energy have been notified of the pending disconnection.
Wilson and Wilson Energy Chief Operating Officer, Diogenes "Dio" Herrera were not immediately available for a comment on the status and conditions of the natural gas wells in question.
Hamilton said the decision came after looking for alternate solutions such as larger transmission lines and contacted natural gas provider Enbridge for possible solutions for sustainability and reliability of service, but "they are capacity constrained" and all other options have been exhausted. Hamilton stated that the 43 customers whose service is being discontinued experienced outages last winter.
"Some customers are miles and miles and miles away from any other supply source," she said.
Jolene Reeder, a resident of Belpre, received the disconnection letter on Monday. She said she received a letter 10 days earlier with no disconnection date, only a notice of potential disruptions. She said she has lived in her home on Briggs Hill since 2018 and hasn't experienced any disruptions in the past year.
Reeder said she contacted Enbridge about connecting to a gas line nearby, but her home is approximately 1,000 feet from the closest tap. She was told the first 100 feet to connect would be covered but she would have to pay around $80 per foot for the other 900 feet.
"It equated to $81,000 for us to be able to connect to Enbridge," she said.
Reeder said if her close neighbors chose to tap into the same line the cost would drop to approximately $21,000, but would take around a year for construction of the lines to be completed and the homes connected to natural gas.
She stated her furnace, hot water heater and stove all run on natural gas and her next step is potentially converting them to propane.
"It's absolutely disgusting and infuriating for these energy groups to expect families to be able to find reliable heat sources in a two-month period. ... and to think more people just have the extra money laying around to be able to (change gas providers) or have things converted to propane," Reeder said.
Ohio Gas Association Distribution and Transportation Company President Jimmy Stewart said that with traditional wells like the ones operated by Wilson Energy, the supply of natural gas depletes over time and eventually there isn't enough, unless the company can tap into a larger transmission line nearby. Unfortunately, this situation is not unique to Washington County, he said.
Sophie Wheeler can be reached at swheeler@newsandsentinel.com.